Psychological Gender Differences Occur as Early as Age 12

A meta-analysis examining psychological studies undertaken in more than 90 countries was published online recently. The goals of this particular analysis, as stated in the abstract are to:

• Estimate the magnitude of the gender difference in depression across a wide array of nations and ages;
• Use a developmental perspective to elucidate patterns of gender differences across the life span;
• Incorporate additional theory-driven moderators

For those of you who don’t speak academese, I’ll translate for you. The goals of the study were to:

• Determine the difference that exists in the occurrence of depression between males and females across a wide range of countries and ages.
• Though somewhat less clear, even to someone forced to speak academese for multiple hours each day, point two seems to state the researchers attempt to correlate the occurrence of depression with not only biological sex, but also age. These data that combine age, sex, and depression frequency will then be applied broadly to speculate about probable biological differences that exist between the sexes during different phases of life.
• I suppose being a biochemist, I’m in the wrong position to assess point three. I’m going to speculate that this indicates the researchers will attempt to account for any specific differences observed between biological sexes through the use of rationalizations about why the differences can’t actually exist. For example, women are not more depressed because of some biological difference, rather it’s because they live in a patriarchal society.

Ultimately, the study concludes:

Age was the strongest predictor of effect size. The gender difference for diagnoses emerged earlier than previously thought, with OR = 2.37 at age 12. For both meta-analyses, the gender difference peaked in adolescence (OR = 3.02 for ages 13–15, and d = 0.47 for age 16) but then declined and remained stable in adulthood. Cross-national analyses indicated that larger gender differences were found in nations with greater gender equity, for major depression, but not depression symptoms.

Interpreting these results there are three relevant take away points… at least initially:

• There are observed differences in the occurrence of depression between males and females, and that this difference is more pronounced at some stages of life relative to others.
• Differences in depression frequency emerge as early as age 12. In other words, 12-year-old girls are more likely to be depressed than 12 year old boys.
• Differences in depression frequency were most pronounced during teenage years from 13 – 16, but then dropped off and remained consistent throughout adulthood.

The obvious take away message, again from my biochemist’s perspective, is that the onset of puberty, a developmental process that further differentiates the sexes and brings people into sexual maturity, is driving actual biochemical differences in each sex that result in different relative depression frequencies between the sexes.

That’s the obvious answer.

Then there’s the answer that presupposes “gender-as-a-social-construct:”

The observed differences are not biological, but are a consequence of different social pressures girls face at age 12. Girls are more likely to start being sexually harassed at age 12 would be one such possibility.

Interestingly, the counterargument to that idea is stated in the blockquote above, but I’ll reproduce it to highlight it below:

Cross-national analyses indicated that larger gender differences were found in nations with greater gender equity, for major depression, but not depression symptoms.

In other words, when the researchers compared depression data across countries and controlled for “gender equity,” the countries with greater gender equity exhibited larger differences between the sexes.

To put it more concisely, in societies where men and women are considered to be more equal, women tend to be even more depressed than their male counterparts.

With respect to recognizing gender as a social construct, I’ll quote the great Dennis Prager: “You’d have to have gone to graduate school to believe something so foolish.”